This Is Why Nurses Will Always Be Second Class Citizens

Ok, so I'm pretty sure that the title is going to tick off a lot of nurses. Maybe even some other healthcare professionals for that matter, but hear me out.

First of all, I'm a nurse. 

I've been a licensed registered nurse since 1995 in the U.S., and everything I'm about to spill is not only true, but I've lived and worked through it myself. This all comes first hand, real time experience and not something heard on the news or skimmed off Instagram,.

The pandemic has shined a huge spotlight on the healthcare stage, and the players who are shining brightest are front-line workers. Generally speaking, when someone gets a spotlight and lots of attention, they have two choices.

1. Use that fifteen minutes of fame to do some good; or

2. Use that same fifteen minutes and make things worse.

Most of you are the latter.

You're fucking things up.

You've taken to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Tik-Tok, and every other free and available platform to highlight all that's wrong with nursing. You've made the posts, the dancing videos, the long worded prose with scathing words, and you've put it all out into the world. You've done this with full knowledge and awareness of this massive, big, bright, glaring fact.

That it's ALWAYS been this way.

Admit it.

We've always been short-staffed…

We've always been underpaid…

We've always been given pizza, instead of raises, for a job well done…

We've always faced workplace violence…

We've always given up a part of us for the good of our patients…

And yet after all these weeks, months, years, and decades, you haven't done a damn thing to move the needle forward except to complain about what you aren't getting.

When all along you should have been TAKING it.

That's why most of us, maybe you, will always remain second-class "healthcare" citizens.

Big brother has told you to form unions. They've said the band together for walkouts. They've said to be better negotiators before you take a job or contract.

And still, nothing changes.

My fellow nurses, what they've never told you and you desperately need to hear is this.

You have the power. Always have, and always will. They've never told you because then they'd know who the true master is.

I totally understand that right about now many folks are reading in disbelief. Maybe even bunches of my fellow RNs are scratching their heads thinking "WTF is this boy on right now, crack?" And others are waiting, with bated breath, to hear exactly HOW I plan to prove my point.

So let's prove the point.

Besides holding a golden license, you also have:

• The ability to problem solve on your feet…
• Multi-task better than any other profession on the planet…
• Critical thinking skills…
• The gift of breaking down the complex into simple…
• And of course, flexibility, empathy, interpersonal skills, attention to detail, etc…

The list goes on.

What they don't want you to know is that you basically have the skillset and knowledge of the world's greatest creators, entrepreneurs, freelancers, starters, hustlers, and basically people who live life on their own terms and call their own shots.

Yet the complaining rolls on.

In the same way the baby elephant is chained to the stake and learns who the master is, even when they become a 2-ton beast and can snap that chain with a flick of one leg; you too have bowed down to those who hold you down when in fact, you ARE the beast.

It's well past time to flick that leg and snap those fucking chains.

It's a lesson I learned 20 years ago, when after 5 years of being a staff RN, getting the pizza, getting assaulted, getting told to work late, getting what was being given to me…that I said no more.

No damn more. I'm not gonna take what they've been shoveling me and I drew my line on the sand. It's a line that any nurse can draw, and in my humble opinion, should.

It's time for you to say "no more".

The spotlight is on you now, the choice is yours. Follow the herd, or blaze your own trail.

******

For more of my writing and breaking those chains, follow me on Instagram or check out my books especially about becoming a freelance nurse.